Cantrell: The Early Years, Part Four

A Request, a Cantrell: The Early Years, Part Four Update

Three weeks later Spock sat in front of his private console gazing at his mother's handsome face coalesced on the small compti screen.  The training cruise successfully completed; he was back in port at his modest base quarters enjoying a short leave between graduating classes.  

Content for now with his mission as a training instructor at the Academy and his recent promotion to the rank of captain, it was a position that would lend itself to some flexibility, allowing room for an active courtship.  Meeting the woman was only the first step, although to that end, things seemed inordinately slow, complicated, leaving him to ponder the feasibility of the whole thing. No doubt other suitors were in the mix. He imagined the line quite long.

So much depended on whether they even liked each other, should the interest prove mutual, he could hardly plan beyond it.  Certainly, after he confessed to T’Pau his breach of the rules, and dared ask “Who is she?’ Her cold response left him little hope. In fact, he may be so far back in the line of suitors, a mere introduction was moot. 

That was probably it, what his mother was finding so difficult to tell him.  Yet, he remained undaunted by that line.  Instead, intrigued by his little mystery woman, he made the decision not neglect this one should he garner the chance, as he had T'Pring, deliberately allowing another man to slip in through the back door, stealing her affections away.  No, this one was special, he had sensed that the moment they touched. 

To that end, Spock had taken measures to keep himself uppermost in the candidate’s mind.  Unable to regain his shattered peace from the moment they broke contact, he had unconsciously sought her out, traveling down that residual psychic link into her very dreams several times already since the original incident.  Indeed, he felt the remnants of her touch even now having wandered into her sleep again last night.  He didn’t know what it was about her, he just couldn’t seem to stay away.  And she, too, always seemed glad he had come.

Spock shifted slightly in his chair, again studying his mother's visage trying to read her.  Initially, he could barely contain his excitement when the call came through.  Now, he was barely able to breathe, the news the Lady Amanda bore unbelievably distressing to her son.  He clasped his hands together, index fingers extended and touching as he drew them to his face in contemplation. 

 "Two things," his mother was saying.  "She's young."
"How young?"  Spock asked.  "She must be seven to sit the K'Matra."
"She's a little over seventeen and a half standard Earth years.  Seven point nine-two, I believe.  In Vulcan years."

"Not so young that we shouldn't at least meet.  What we experienced was extra-ordinary.  I fail to understand the harm here," Spock said.  "I am merely asking to meet her.  Anything else can wait."

"It's not as easy as that, I’m afraid."

"The other obstacle?"  The depth of that line of suitors, no doubt, Spock thought.
His mother visibly sighed.  "She's human," Amanda said quietly.   

"I see," Spock said, nodding resolutely.   "I am a fool to believe my life will ever be my own.  That my choices will ever be deemed sufficient.  Tell me, Mother, if I were still the second son would that fact make any difference?"  Spock said, assuming at once that his social position had everything to do with it. 

He was First Son of the Ruling House of Talek Sen Deen.  It just never occurred to him before that fact would stand in his way. His father, the Elder Son of the House had married a human.  Of course, his first marriage to a Vulcan princess had produced a true First Son;  The one who had ruthlessly jammed the crown onto the head of his younger half-brother before he fled in disgrace!

He left Spock with all the pressures, family responsibilities and trappings of their Nobility.  Trappings that were beginning to pinch, Spock decided, shifting uncomfortably in his seat again.  So this is to be my legacy . . . It was all he could do to conceal his anger.   Amanda gazed at her son with kind eyes that bespoke her understanding.  His had not been an easy way.  At last he spoke.

 "I tried to follow the Traditional course.  With a woman I never found entirely acceptable or agreeable.  Now in a manner I cannot explain I have found my soulmate.  I have touched her and felt my future.  There was something there, Mother.  Even in that fleeting moment.  You may tell my father if I am denied this woman, it is highly unlikely I shall ever marry.  I am not threatening.  I am merely pointing out that the odds are increasingly against it.  The possibilities dwindling."

"Spock, it's not about the House of Talek Sen Deen. We haven't even gotten that far.   It's about the feelings of a father."
"Mother, my father is Vulcan.  He does not subscribe . . . "

“Hers, not yours." Amanda said.  "You touched a human girl and her human father is furious!  You would have had an easier time of it I'm afraid had you been caught on the couch making out with his teenaged daughter.  That he understands.  But you mindmelded with her.  And in some real sense, I suppose, he perceives that as the greater threat.  Because through the mindmeld she really does become yours."

Spock tilted his head to the side in contemplation.  "Are all human fathers typically this jealous?"
"Some.  And some human mothers, too," she confessed.  "There have been one or two women you've brought around over the years I haven't felt were good enough for you."

"Indeed?"
"Indeed," she said with a small grin. 
"Where do we go from here?"

"We don't,” Amanda sighed, heavily. “Her father forbids any pursuit of the matter.  He wants her to grow up and fall in love with someone when she's old enough to know what love is.  He won't release her name.  We don't even know who the father is.  He spoke to the Council through an electronic disguise."

"She is the Anomaly.  No other human has sat the Test," Spock reasoned, leaning back in his chair.
"Yes, of course.  But her true identity has been carefully preserved all these years by order of the High Priestess, T'Lar.  Even High Councilor T'Pau who presided over the Test is bound by Oath not to reveal who she is.  Try to understand, dear.   It has always been for her protection."

"I see," Spock said quietly.  He drew in his lower lip in a manner his mother recognized as a sign of distress.  

"I'm so sorry, son.”  Amanda shook her head, looking vexed, her aged blue eyes sympathetic.  “This whole thing has gotten completely out of hand.  It's become politicized.  Other Houses have gotten into the middle." 

"You would, of course, be referring to Sarkal of the House of Kooli Ton Lok and his cousin Strone of Seltu Dai Sei."  Spock said, sitting forward again.
"As per their habit of late, yes.  Using any opportunity afforded them to jockey themselves into a better political standing.  Or so it would appear. It doesn’t help matters that Lord Sobel has called for the girl to have a keeper. Of course, he submits Sarkal . . . I know of the rivalry that exists between you two ---"    

"Mother, that presumes ego.  As a Vulcan ---"
"Oh please, dear, it's only too plain Sarkal wishes he were you.  Now, spare me the litany and just listen," his mother said carefully.  "You're not to press the issue.  By order of the Council.  Don't defy them.  Promise me you'll let the matter drop.  At least for now.  The House of Talek Sen Deen can ill afford the scandal."

"And my father?  I would know his views.  I presume he is most displeased.  This certainly will not serve to ease things between us."
"Your father has retreated to his meditation."
"Both his sons have caused him disgrace."  Spock sighed quietly.  "It is something I swore I would never do."

"You cannot make up for the sins of your brother.  And if there is any disgrace in all of this, it's in the actions of the others.  Not yours.  Kiftiri, Spock.  That's what T'Pau has labeled it and T'Lar has concurred with her.  Your father is merely --- Frustrated at his inability to make the Council see reason.  I only wish I had known what was happening at the time.  I witnessed her test.  At the reception later that evening I exchanged a few pleasantries with her.  Oh, she was completely veiled, and we weren't given her name.  I couldn't pick her out on the street, I suppose . . ."

"There is nothing you could have done, Mother.  I, on the other hand, am going to have to once again seek the Kolinahr and become a monk," he said.
"Oh, Spock, no.  Don't give up.  In only a few, short years she'll be of age.  Why, I was barely twenty when I married your father."  

"But I do not know who she is," Spock insisted.  

"Sometimes you simply have to rely on a higher source.  Kismet, Spock.  If you're truly meant to be together, you'll meet again," his mother assured him.  Spock wished he shared her illogical rational just now. He signed off and went to bed later that evening feeling the pain of his autonomy more acutely than ever before. 

In the twilight of sleep, he reached for the girl, reliving the memory of their encounter like a video recording over and over in his head until, sound asleep, he was no longer alone . . . “I deeply apologize,” he pressed into her thoughts. “This will have to be the last time we meet like this. If I could change things, I would.

Author’s Note: Again, this is taken mostly intact from my published Star Trek fanfiction mini-series, Star Trek Night Whispers; Volume One, chapter Ten.